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London will be hit hard by student fees hike

Tuesday, 12 October 2010 16:48

Commenting on the government’s welcome of the Browne review into Higher Education funding, Ken Livingstone said:

“The higher cost of living in London means that students graduating from their degrees will be hit even harder here than elsewhere.

“The government talks about the need to reduce the national debt, despite the damage its approach will mean to the economy, but has no hesitation in ratcheting up graduate debt.  The government is going to make students pay for an economic situation that bankers, not students, created.

“This policy will deter poorer students and squeeze very hard those on middle incomes once they have graduated.

“If the government imposes this policy it will have a particularly severe impact in London, which has the largest student population in the country and where those graduates already contending with the higher cost of living in London would be saddled with debt repayments at the same time as they struggle to make ends meet. Trying to pay for the cost of a flat is already hard enough for most graduates in London – now repayments on even bigger tuition debts will be hanging over them too.   

“Boris Johnson has been silent on the Browne review today despite the particularly sharp impact the government’s approach would have on London.  The mayor has time to write his £250,000-a-year Telegraph column every week but not to comment on behalf of families and students who will have to contend with even higher costs as a result of his Parliamentary colleagues’ attack on middle and lower income people.”